Reflections on Week 9

This is week 9 and we are approaching the terminal stage of the 10 week Web Skill course. The theme of this week is learning styles and technology tools for multiple intelligences. I started by visiting the following website http://www.edutopia.org/multiple-intelligences-learning-styles-quiz to learn about my own learning styles. I responded to some online tasks and I printed my learning styles results which is shown below. My highest score was on the Naturalistic style 100% and my least score was on the Linguistic one 67%.

A quick look at this result will show that I am Naturalistic. I do agree with this, but I was surprised to discover that my Linguistic intelligence was the least one. I do not really know, but I am skeptical so I will try the quiz again after a week or so to see what results I will get. Do you think that I will get the same results? I am not sure, but it is worth trying, isn't it? When I redo the quiz, I will compare and contrast the two sets of data just to have fun.

Learning Styles and Technology Tools

Howard Gardner, a professor at Harvard Graduate School, devised the theory of multiple intelligences with eight intelligences. The intelligences listed by Gardner include; linguistic intelligence, logical-mathematical intelligence, musical intelligence, bodily-kinesthetic intelligence, spatial intelligence, interpersonal intelligence, and intrapersonal intelligence.

The main idea of the different learning styles and multiple intelligences is that our students possess different kinds of minds. Therefore, they learn, remember, perform, and understand in different ways.

In what follows, I am going to share my own understanding and practices of using technology to address a variety of learning styles and multiple intelligences. When incorporating technology into our classes, we must remember that one type of technology does not fit all students. During the first sessions of my courses at the university, I will try to find out what learning styles the majority of my students in class possess in order to meet the needs of most of them, if not all.

Combining the multiple intelligences with the thoughtful and purposeful use of technology can have a great impact on students’ achievement. For example, the student blog can be a great tool for the intrapersonal learner while the interpersonal learner will work better in the class blog than in the student blog because the interpersonal learners will enjoy working in groups. I will assign the interpersonal learners as group leaders, but not the intrapersonal ones. I will engage my kinesthetic learners by making them my technology helpers. I will engage the visual learners by making them research famous quotes and pictures or images and then give a short presentation using a Power Point. This activity will also include the linguistic learners in the classroom. Students can perform an internet search to locate hundreds of quotes and pictures. Once their research is complete, they can share their work with the use of Power Point or Prezi. This activity allows the spatial students to express their creativity while still covering necessary content. Methods for mixing technology and the learning style linguistic intelligence can be recording each lecture and giving the students the ability to listen to each lecture by downloading the lecture onto the class webpage or onto YouTube.

Web searches for a linguistic learner would come easy because of the innate ability to use words effectively in the search bar. Creativity is the key for the visual learners. They enjoy video-camera projects. The linguistic learners have the ability to manipulate the syntax or structure of language, the phonology or sounds of language, the semantics or meanings of language, and the pragmatic dimensions or practical uses of language. Manipulating syntax can be made easy with a computer. Giving the students permission to bring their personal laptops into the classroom can give them more than the ability to take notes.

To sum up, a piece of technology can be used to meet the needs of more than one learning style, and one learning style can be reached by more than one piece of technology.